


Against Every Difficulty

by Elizabeth (anghraine)



Series: The Machiavelli AU [1]
Category: 16th Century CE RPF, Cesare (Manga), The Borgias (2011)
Genre: Alternate History, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Brother-Sister Relationships, F/M, Gen, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-03
Updated: 2014-02-03
Packaged: 2018-01-11 01:06:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 265
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1166770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anghraine/pseuds/Elizabeth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rodrigo and Cesare don't fall ill in 1503; Rodrigo lives another year, and Cesare's position is secure by the time Julius comes to power.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Against Every Difficulty

**Author's Note:**

> This takes place in some weird amalgamation of the Showtime series and the Cesare manga, with some actual history thrown in for good measure.

_The Pope demands your submission_ , she writes. The Pope. Julius. It hurts to write it. She would rather leave it at Cardinal della Rovere, forever: but who knows what eyes might first see her letter?

Cesare’s reply comes quickly and securely; Miquelet, now Don Michele, places it in her hand himself.

_The Pope may demand whatever he wishes._ It’s in Cesare’s own hand, his precise, elegant letters. She can almost hear the words in his voice, carelessly snapped out. But they would not be these words, were he here. Italian is for company, for speeches, for matters of state—Valencian for secrets murmured into her ear, home and family. They always use Valencian together, her to him and him to her and both to her children: but he’s scrawled out his defiance in Italian.

Not so careless, then. He means it to be read. Heard. Carried from Ferrara to Mantua to—Rome?

Ah, yes. Even Cesare would rather not march on the papal armies without a pretext.

Lucrezia’s eyes skim down the page. He’s dashed off a few lines in Valencian at the end, after the usual inquiries after her health and indifferent good wishes to Alfonso. _Do not fear for yourself;—if Julius lifts a finger against Ferrara, the Romagna and Tuscany will stand in his way and I shall see that he suffers for it. You may depend on this, sister, and trust that your peace is a greater matter to me than my own life, or anyone else’s._

He signs himself Cèsar de Borja. Somehow, that feels like another kind of defiance.

**Author's Note:**

> _But five years after the duke had first drawn his sword, Alexander died, leaving him with only the state of the Romagna consolidated, and with all the others up in the air, between two very powerful enemy armies, and deathly ill. Yet, there was in the duke such great ferocity and so much virtù, and so well did he know how men were to be won over or destroyed, and so sturdy were the foundations he had laid in so short a time, that if he had not had those two armies on top of him, or if he had been healthy, he would have held out against every difficulty._
> 
>  
> 
> \--Niccolò Machiavelli, _The Prince_


End file.
